JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Earth Day: it's a tradition that started 54 years ago, committed to keeping cities like Jacksonville clean.
"It may be hard to imagine that before 1970, a factory could feed right files of toxic smoke into the air or dump tons of toxic waste into a nearby stream," Deegan told First Coast News. "And it was all perfectly possible. Now, because there was no APA, no Clean Air Act, no Clean Water Act, there were no legal or regulatory mechanisms to protect our environment."
Now that's changed, and to show the city's commitment to keeping Jacksonville environmentally friendly, more than a dozen volunteers including the mayor, spent Monday morning picking up trash along Hogan's Creek, working together to clean one of the many waterways throughout the city.
"Twenty million Americans demonstrated in different U.S. cities, and half a century later, are saying it is the largest civic event on Earth, activating billions across 192 countries to safeguard our planet and fight for a brighter future," Deegan said.
Jacksonville's Sustainability Manager Ashantae Green led the event, emphasizing how Duval County residents should treat every day like it's Earth Day.
“It's the air that we breathe, it's the cars that we drive, it's the way we eat and support local farmers, it is all a part of the ways we can inform our society and our economy in a green way,” Green said.
The volunteers achieved their goal of leaving Klutho Park much cleaner than when they started. But despite the cleanup, Deegan said she and the city has plans to keep up with sustainability efforts even after Earth Day.
"My administration is doing its part not just for cleanups like today, [but also] along with our climate plan and greenhouse gas inventories that have been submitted to the EPA," Deegan said.
With Deegan recently joining the mayor's coalition, she adds that the city's departments are focused on resiliency and sustainability as priorities. Currently on the city of Jacksonville's to-do list is to ramp up efforts to address blight, plant thousands of more trees, and electrify the public transit buses fleet, which will save tens of millions of dollars, according to Deegan.
"It's an exciting time for the city as we focus aggressively on how we can use our resources to address the effects of climate change and beautify our city and make our home more resilient for future generations," Deegan told First Coast News.